


Respecting Tradition

by Jedi Buttercup (jedibuttercup)



Category: Showdown in Little Tokyo (1991)
Genre: Banter, Chromatic Character, Multi, Non-Graphic Violence, Slashy, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000, Yuletide 2009
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-20
Updated: 2009-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-04 18:41:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/32937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedibuttercup/pseuds/Jedi%20Buttercup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Hey Kenner," Johnny said.  "If we're going to keep sharing the last few seconds of our lives on a regular basis, there's something I should tell you."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Respecting Tradition

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Grey_Bard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grey_Bard/gifts).



Johnny Murata's mother once told him, when he was a young man freshly dumped by his first girlfriend, not to sweat life's little disappointments; that he would know the person he was meant to spend the rest of his life with when he found all their worst flaws more endearing than annoying, and when they seemed to feel the same way about him. Girl-next-door Peggy Beall simply had not been that person.

He doubted that his current situation was what she'd had in mind, though. For one thing, she'd probably assumed that 'the rest of his life' would be longer than just the following few minutes. For another, his _cop_ partner wasn't exactly the type of person guys typically brought home to meet their mothers. And not just because he was male, either.

"You just _had_ to insist we come back and eat fish off the naked chicks," Detective Chris Kenner said, ducking behind a downed table in one of the low, recessed areas of the floor as a gunman fired another hail of bullets in their direction.

It was hardly Johnny's fault, though, that he had apparently inherited his mother's taste in men along with his coloring and his talent for Bushido. Headstrong, whiter than rice, inappropriately funny on a frequent basis, and the only person able to keep up with her for more than a few days at a time-- that was how she'd phrased it, and he couldn't argue. ('Hung like a horse', too, though he'd never wanted to know any such thing about his father). She'd probably get a kick out of Kenner, as a matter of fact; sooner or later, Johnny was going to have to take him out to the Valley.

"How was I supposed to know this would happen?" he replied, edging out from behind his own cover just enough to reach for the tray one of the servers had dropped when she'd bolted for the exit.

She hadn't got very far; a few paces beyond the tray, the stacked brunette lay curled amidst the shattered remains of the cups she'd been carrying, moaning around the bullet wound in her thigh. It didn't appear life threatening, but it was undoubtedly painful. Johnny tried to assure her silently that they were going to resolve the situation as soon as possible, then snagged the tray with his fingertips and ducked back behind the big, upholstered chair just in time to evade another round of shots.

"This is the Bonsai Club," Kenner snorted. "Haven't you read the file on this place? Tanaka ran an illegal fight club out of it, and Yoshida wanted it as a front for his Yakuza drug business, but the task force had a reason to stop here practically every other week before that. There was a _reason_ I wasn't allowed in the front door before, you know."

"_Now_ he tells me," Johnny muttered, then threw Kenner a grin and cocked his arm back. He glanced over the ugly orange chair-back just long enough to get a good line of sight on the man targeting Kenner, then popped up and threw the tray as swiftly and accurately as he could manage.

It flew true; he heard a grunt and clatter as it struck the gunman in the face, and a cacophony of startled voices broke out. He couldn't understand what the other henchmen were saying, but he didn't need to know the exact words to realize it was a good time to make a move.

"Hey Kenner," he said, rolling away from the chair toward his partner as he took aim at another of the shooters. The perp was just turning back toward him as he fired; the man took two bullets in the shoulder and another in the chest before going down. "If we're going to keep sharing the last few seconds of our lives on a regular basis, there's something I should tell you."

Kenner grunted, capitalizing on the diversion to put a bullet in tray-guy and wing a third shooter. "This doesn't have anything to do with my dick, does it?"

Johnny rolled his eyes as he dropped down next to Kenner behind the table. "No, asshole," he said, smirking. "Compliment a guy's favorite feature once, and he never lets you forget it."

Kenner smirked back. "Then save it for later," he said. "Because this isn't even _close_ to being the last few seconds of our lives." He cocked his head at another stream of incomprehensible virulence emanated from the direction of the stage, and sprang up suddenly over the table, lunging toward the nearest man still standing. The guy dropped his gun-- either jammed or out of bullets, Johnny couldn't tell which-- and threw up his arms in a hasty attempt at a martial arts stance.

It wouldn't do him much good against Kenner, of course. Before the day Johnny had rushed into Matsuno's Sushi and tried to flip an unknown blond gunman over his shoulder, only to discover that the man was his new partner, he'd never met another cop who could match him in a hand-to-hand fight. He'd definitely never expected to find that kind of ability and training in anyone as heavily muscled as Kenner. Kenner had surprised him, though, ducking out of Johnny's hold and flipping _him_ to the ground instead, and had had the gall to insult his form later that day on their first trip to that very club. No henchman low-ranked enough to be left behind when his _oyabun_ ducked out the back door was likely to have the skill required to take Kenner down.

His partner's move had coaxed the fourth and last gunman up behind the bar to draw a bead on him. Johnny aimed for the gun-- the only part of the perp he had a good angle on-- and shot it right out of his hand. Then he lunged up and over the table himself, stopping just short of the man's position to spin on his heel and aim a high kick over the counter.

The gunman took a grazing blow to the chin from Johnny's shoe and stumbled backward, knocked off balance. Then he laid his hands on a bottle and lunged back in Johnny's direction, blood streaming from the corner of his mouth. A quick tap on the counter turned the bottle into a jagged collection of knife edges, and Johnny stepped back, not exactly eager to add his own flesh to the raw meat on offer. He waited a careful moment, timing the guy's moves as he waved the bottle through the air, then feinted a couple of times to see what he would do, while behind him the sounds of knuckles striking flesh told Johnny how Kenner's fight was progressing.

His opponent raised the bottle again, and Johnny smiled, pivoting and darting in with a quick blow to the guy's throat. The perp gasped for air, the bottle wavering in his hand, and Johnny vaulted over the counter to plant a kick solidly in his groin, knocking him staggering. The bottle fell from his hands, but he still had the presence of mind to snag at something else propped in a corner; Johnny ducked and swore as a solid broom handle impacted on his right shoulder, then gripped it with his other hand and used it as leverage to yank the guy off his feet.

"Bad move," Johnny told him, then kicked away the broken bottle and knelt to flip the perp over, yanking his hands up behind his back.

"Read him his rights yet?" Kenner teased, leaning suddenly over the counter.

"Done with yours already, champ?" Johnny raised his eyebrows and smiled up at him.

Kenner nodded. "Trussed up like a hog," he said. "Back-up's on its way."

"At least we don't have to run from them this time." Johnny shifted, planting his knee in the back of the guy he was handcuffing, then read off his rights over the sounds of incomprehensible cursing. "You know, I probably _should_ learn some Japanese one of these days, if only so I can interrogate these guys effectively."

"Not so keen on getting reassigned any more?" Kenner grinned.

"Hey, _you_ were the one who said you wanted me gone." Johnny planted his hands on his thighs and stood, suppressing a groan as his muscles began to complain the abuse he'd put them to. Adrenaline highs were a wonderful thing; the aftermath, not so much. "I'm not going to change my mind just because we stumbled into something on your first day back from medical leave. Again. Speaking of which." He leaned over the counter to prod at his partner's chest. "How's the shoulder?"

Kenner frowned down at the exposed expanse of skin-- somehow, he'd torn his shirt as he fought his way across the club, and he'd left his leather jacket behind the upturned table-- and flexed the muscle where Yoshida's gunshot had pierced through. "Just a twinge," he decided. "Remind me next time to just take you to Mama-san's when you want a public reintroduction to your native culture."

"I keep telling you, it's not _my_ culture," Johnny replied, reaching out to lay his palm over the puckered scar. It wasn't radiating any extra heat above the general warmth of sweaty flesh; it didn't feel like he'd done himself any additional damage. This time. "I was here for the naked chicks, not the raw fish. Besides, I thought you'd decided you didn't want to crowd Minako at her new job?"

Kenner shrugged, pecs shifting under Johnny's touch, and he let his hand drop.

"Yoshida spun her some line about beauty needing to be possessed and protected," Kenner explained. "She's still a little sensitive about it. I like the food at Matsuno's, but I recommended her for the job there, I don't want her to think I'm hovering."

"Still following your theory of letting her make all the moves?" Johnny teased, raising his eyebrows. Minako Okeya had survived being kidnapped and ill used not once, but twice during the same calamitous serious of events that had brought Johnny and Kenner together as partners and resulted in the death of the Yakuza boss, Funekei Yoshida, who had killed Kenner's parents when he was nine. Johnny figured she had a right to be however sensitive she needed to be, to feel safe. Fortunately, his partner seemed to feel the same way.

"Seems to be working out so far," Kenner replied, with a smug grin.

The sound of approaching sirens abruptly penetrated the blue-lit dimness of the club, breaking the mood. Johnny stepped back, stooping for the handgun he'd dropped just shy of the counter when he'd tackled the fourth perp, and glanced around at the chaos they'd created. "Backup's arriving," he said, unnecessarily.

"About time." Kenner headed for the table where he'd left his jacket, and shrugged it back on over his torn black t-shirt. Johnny tracked him across the room as he holstered his gun, watching the play of muscle under the ridiculously loosely-cut slacks Kenner wore. The things were practically parachute pants, with plenty of room in the groin and thigh for a full range of movement; Johnny would never have been able to get away with anything half so ridiculous-looking, even with Bushido as an excuse, but no one in his right mind was ever going to challenge Kenner about them. Not even Minako, who seemed to find his obsessive devotion to Japanese customs and habits endearing.

Of course, she seemed to find Johnny's lack of same fairly amusing, too, the few times they'd all had dinner together at Kenner's apartment. He hadn't had the heart to tell her-- or Kenner, who'd found the spectacle immensely entertaining-- that his mother had insisted he at least learn how to hold chopsticks correctly, he just preferred to use a fork. She'd had way too much fun positioning his fingers for him on the eating utensils so he could properly appreciate her cooking.

He'd be willing to appreciate a whole lot more than that, if she wanted; she was one fine woman. But that fell under the category of 'letting her make all the moves', and she hadn't. She seemed content with occasionally pouncing on Kenner-- and encouraging Johnny to drag Kenner out of the dojo when she wasn't around. Which, he could already tell, seemed inevitably destined to frequently end in scenes like this one. Good thing he didn't mind.

"So, Murata," Kenner said, picking his way back across the floor. "What was it that you wanted to tell me?"

Johnny crossed his arms and assumed an indifferent air. "And why should I tell you now? We aren't about to die in the _next_ few seconds, either."

Kenner crossed his own arms and took up a position next to him, facing the door, where they'd both have a good view of the officers arriving on the scene. "Humor me."

The corners of Johnny's mouth twitched in a quickly suppressed grin. "All right, you twisted my arm. So. You remember what I said about the flower arranging?"

Kenner shot him a narrow-eyed glance. "I remember telling you that a warrior who knows only one side..."

"Yadda yadda," Johnny cut him off. "My mother agreed with you, actually, and said I was going to learn one of the traditional arts if it killed me."

"I'm guessing you didn't choose the tea ceremony, or haiku," Kenner said dryly, though a spark of curiosity had lit in his eyes. "Or even calligraphy-- though that might've been useful; the captain might appreciate our reports more if they at least _looked_ attractive when they crossed his desk."

"Nope," Johnny rocked on his heels, attention on the door as it slammed open, admitting several uniforms. He waved one of them over, keen to get the necessary proceedings over with and resume their night off. "I picked origami."

"Origami?" Kenner sounded surprised. "Did you ever complete a _senbazuru_?"

"If you mean the 'thousand paper cranes' thing..." Johnny shrugged, spreading his hands in a 'who, me?' gesture. "I _did_ have a lot of time and paper on my hands as a kid."

"Tradition holds that if you make a wish after folding each one, it'll come true," Kenner suggested, tone rising almost enough to add a question mark, though he didn't go so far as to actually take the bait and ask.

Johnny glanced over to eye him up and down, grinning again in appreciation of the strange mixture of outright crazy and striking competence that was his partner. "That is what tradition says," he agreed blandly, then turned his attention back to the incoming officer, who'd paused to direct a medic to the injured server.

You certainly couldn't prove the tradition wrong by him. Not that he was going to actually spell that out for Kenner; he intended to make the other man work for his answer.

Lucky for Johnny Murata, Chris Kenner was no Peggy Beall. He didn't think his partner would mind.

\---


End file.
